The Democratic press. [volume] (Ravenna, O. [Ohio]) 1868-1901, 1887-07-28
THE WILD FRESHMAN.


EN- route to Dublin and Queenstown.
The wild Irishman is the fast train
which carries the American mails from
London to Holyhead, en- route to Dub
i'm and Queenstown. 1t drives down
from Euston to Chester at speed of
forty miles on more an hour, and issu-
ing from that quaint, gabled, and gal
leried city through a gap in the spien-
did walls, it continues on its course to
Holyhead along the picturesque shore
of North Wales.
Many Americans travel by it. as in
leaving or in joining the Atlantic
steamer at Queenstown they can save
several hours by taking this route, but
it is usually night when they are borne
along, and the journey finds no dwell
ing-place in their memories. Pre-
cipitous cliffs frown down upon the
train; ON one side are the
stormy waters'of the St. Georges chan
mel, and on the other the mountains
descend without any intervening foot
hills; but by means OF tunnels, en-
and viaducts every natural
obstacle in the route of the Wild irish
man has been overcome.
The distance between Chester and
Holyhead is accomplished in less than
two hours; tubular bridge spans the
Menai Strait, the ferrying of which
formerly led to many tragedies; an
other bridge is hung over the Conway
River, and Penmaenmawr is pierced
by tunnel, through which the train
winds like ring through the nose OF
a savage.
When the train leaves Chester it al
most Immediately crosses the bound
ary line between Cheshire and North
Wales, and for the rest OF the distance
to Holyhead it is in that eountry. z
On the other side of the train hes q
country of increasing hilliness "a land-
scape like that of England. with trim
hedge-rows, matched cottages, and the
solid-looking sculpturesque foliage
which is a sort of atonement for the
persistent humidity of the climate.
Hawarden, Mr.. Gladstone's seat, is
about two miles off the line, and about
twenty minutes after leaving Chester
the train runs close against the walls
of Flint Castle-a gaunt mass of naked
rock, upon which decay has set no sign
of regret, and age has put no assaag-
ing mantle. The castle was built by
Edward l., and Shakespeare has made
its rude ribs" and 'stattered" battle
ments one of his scenes in his play of
Richard III.
Behind the hills which slope down
to Flint is Holywell, town which de-
rives its name from a miraculoHsly CO.
pious spring, of such efficacy ia heal
ing that the beautiful gothic shEine
built over it, and ascrihed to the gem
erosity of the.mother of Henry VII, is
hung with the crutches and trusses of
those who have been cured by bathing
in it. IS
The Wild Irishman scarcely slaekens
its speed at Rhyl, the fiat and rectan-
gular little watering-place whose noisy
excursionists from Lancashire and
Yorkshire bathe in yellow mixture OF
mud washed down from the Dee and
the Mersey. But presently we cross a
river which, flowing down from be-
tween high hills, empties into the sea
within sight of the train, at a point
where massive headland juts out
ward, and reaching the farther side.
we are borne under the shadow of a
cliff-like wall. We look out and up,
and there are towers. battlements, and
parapets. These are so high, and the
train is so close to the base, that we
have TO almost dislocate our neck in
order to see the summit. 1t is cas-
tie, not cliff; but it seems to grow
out of the rock upon which it stands,
and when it was built nature and art
Joined hands to give it a double
strength.
When Edward l. had conquered the
Welsh he built three great castles to
keep the vanquished down, and though
dismantled and despoiled,. they an
still very substantial examples of ths
architecture of his time; enc is at Car
naryon, another at Beamaris, and thu
third is this at Conway, the common
name of the river we have just crossed
the castle, and the little town which
lies under the castle, shut within q
harp-shaped wall which formerly had
twenty-feur round towers. =.
4 minute or two after the train
leaves Conway the mountains begin tG
crowd down upon the Wild Irishman
and threaten to shove the line into the
sea. 1t is these that the traveller from
America sees from the deck of the
ocean steamer as she; passes up the St
Georges Channel to Liverpool They
| are northern spur of the Snowdor
range, and among the, bnddled masse:
| rises one, a very Gibraltar of peak
higher than all the rest.
Once again we are in darkness, bul
| this time the reverberations are moi
those of tunnel. The sounds are hol
low and metallic; we are crossing the
strait by the'vast tubular bridge which
| Stephenson built between 1876 anC
1850, and which put an end to the fire
| quent accidents that had previously oc
Cured to passengers scrossing by tn,
| ferry. The Britannia Bridge, as it j.
called, consists of eight tubes resting
ON three towers, and it spans the
stream at height of 1914 feet 1t il
| 1,841 feet long, and the tubes are said
to contain II, 400 tons of iron. Some
fellow passenger is sure to put US II
possession of these dimensions, but We
who have seen the Brooklyn Bridg,
can listen unmoved, and give him il
return the statistics of a much greatel
| achievement.
One end of the bridge that by which
we enter-is in Carnarvonshire, ant
when we reach the other we are in thu
island of Anglesey, the Mona of earl,
English history. and the last refuge o
the Druids. It is not a very larg'
island, only twenty miles from nortl
to south, and twenty-eight miles from
east to west. The surface is rolling
| and (if such word can be employed
to describe anything in nature) com
monplace, but, except in the straits
the seaward edge is, a long line o
cliffs of varying height. at whose fee
many ship has seene to grief. Their
are many Druidieal4 remains en- tn
! island, cromlechs and other enigmati
cal masses of stone which the old hier
| archy of the woods has left unex
| planned, and it was in Anglesey tina
Suetonius burned the last of the Druid
| in their own altar fires.
A few miles from Holyhead we pas
within short distance of Aberffraw
| the seat of the native Princes of Wales
and thus the Wild Irishman complete
its course, and lands US at the gang
way of the channel steamer.
1t is then that we discover what al
empty, noiseless little place Holyhea,
is. 1t is the nearest port to Ireland
and that is, and always has been, tn
reason of its existence.-W II. Ride
ing in Harper'e Magazine.